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Apropos of simply chatting around the topic, I always (well, for the last five years or so - took me many years to get to this point) say out loud in such meeti

Apropos of simply chatting around the topic, I always (well, for the last five years or so - took me many years to get to this point) say out loud in such meetings that if there's no budget for it, the company doesn't really care. In the last year, after the powers-that-be said they believed in training, saying that out loud has won my team 5% of their time and some capital expenditure for training (works out to a little over a day every month that can be spent on the company dime explicitly reading, watching training materials or other such), and when those same powers said they believed in continuous improvement of the product, on the order of 15% of the team's time can now be booked to just that; working on things that don't provide new features or bugfixes for customers, but just make the software better in general. I was surprised at just how much it turned out that the company really did believe in continuous improvement of the product, when I challenged the powers-that-be to put their money where their mouth is; I am a little worried that if I hadn't opened my mouth, we wouldn't be doing it, but then I suppose that's why people like me are employed - to open our mouths. I'm not sure know I would spend budget in support of "being proud to be part of BigCo going forwards", but I'd still ask for it and still say that if there wasn't any, it wasn't true. Money seems to sharpen the corporate mind very effectively and force people to actually confront the values they espouse.

tomcam 8y ago
That’s an inspiring story. Awesome how you compelled them to put their money where there mouth is.
slededit 8y ago
If your in frontline management isn't that basically your job? To translate company goals to on the ground action? I suppose its a little surprising to hear upper management is not spouting BS, but I now also wonder how much of that is frontline management simply not acting on the vision.
- EliRivers 8y ago
  If your in frontline management isn't that basically your job? To translate company goals to on the ground action? Surely that's everyone's job? To know and understand the company's goals and ensure that their actions are in support. I certainly try to ensure that everyone on my team (is "software team lead", one among many, considered frontline management? I honestly don't know where people draw the lines) knows what the bigger goals are, and I routinely push questions and comment about those goals back up. I try to advocate that it is never wrong to pursue the company's goals, and demand from directors that people who come a cropper while, in good faith pursuing the direction that the directors have set, will not suffer for it. We are quite a small company so it's quite easy to badger directors to provide direction. Don't know how this would go in a larger company.

tomcam 8y ago

That’s an inspiring story. Awesome how you compelled them to put their money where there mouth is.

slededit 8y ago

If your in frontline management isn't that basically your job? To translate company goals to on the ground action? I suppose its a little surprising to hear upper management is not spouting BS, but I now also wonder how much of that is frontline management simply not acting on the vision.

EliRivers 8y ago
If your in frontline management isn't that basically your job? To translate company goals to on the ground action? Surely that's everyone's job? To know and understand the company's goals and ensure that their actions are in support. I certainly try to ensure that everyone on my team (is "software team lead", one among many, considered frontline management? I honestly don't know where people draw the lines) knows what the bigger goals are, and I routinely push questions and comment about those goals back up. I try to advocate that it is never wrong to pursue the company's goals, and demand from directors that people who come a cropper while, in good faith pursuing the direction that the directors have set, will not suffer for it. We are quite a small company so it's quite easy to badger directors to provide direction. Don't know how this would go in a larger company.